integration and intensification

1. Process improvement in
sulfur industries
(Claus process)
Prepared by :
Nurul Najwa Bte Mustafa
SA10100
Noor Azizah Bt Md Jenal
SA10101

2. INTroduction
 A catalytic chemical process that is
used for converting gaseous
hydrogen sulphide (H2S) into
elemental sulphur (S).
 The most significant
gas desulfurizing process, recoveri
ng elemental sulfur from
gaseous hydrogen sulfide.

3. Process improvement
 Related to the development of
more efficient technologies.
 Two type’s most important
approaches are
i) process integration
ii)process intensification.

4. Process intergration
2 H2S + O2 → S2 + 2 H2O
Process Integration does not stop with
the synthesis of process flow sheets for
individual processes. Individual processes
would normally operate as part of an
integrated manufacturing site consisting of a

5. Process intensification
 Refers to any chemical engineering
development that leads to a
substantially
smaller, cleaner, and more
energy efficient technology

6. Example
 Superclaus catalyst
 A tail gas clean-up process
 Oxygen Enrichment Of Sulfur
Recovery Units (Sru)
 Partial oxidation

7. Superclaus Catayst
 Designed to give complete and highly selective
conversion of H2S to elemental sulfur, low
formation of SO2, and low sensitivity to water
concentrations in the process gas so it has no
Claus reaction reactivity.
 The catalyst consists of active metal oxides on
a carrier. Its properties include the
following:
i. H2S conversion to sulfur higher than 85%
ii. not sensitive to excess air, not sensitive to
high water concentrations,
iii.no CO/H2 oxidation,
iv.no formation of COS/CS2,

8. A tail gas clean-up process
 to allow the process to increase the
conversion
 An example is the amine-based
tailgascean-up process, which
reduces all of the sulfur compounds
in the tailgas leaving the front-end
Claus sulfur plant back to H2S, then
uses selective amine absorption to
remove the H2S while allowing most
of the carbon dioxide to slip by. The
H2S and carbon dioxide removed by

9. Oxygen Enrichment Of Sulfur Recovery
Units (Sru)
 To enrich the combustion air in the Claus
burner with oxygen.
 Because of oxygen enrichment, inert
nitrogen is kept out of the Claus plant
due to less air flow, so that the gas
volume and the pressure drop there are
reduced compared with the original
operation with air. The pressure
difference gained by oxygen enrichment
can be used to transport the gas through
the subsequent tail-gas cleanup.
 Can also be used to add more crude-gas-

10. Cost & benefits
SUPERCLAUS PROCESS
 To give complete and highly
selective conversion of H2S to
elemental sulfur, low formation
of SO2 and low sensitivity to water
concentrations in the process gas.
 Other than that, higher activities
have been achieved with catalysts
that provide higher surface areas
and macro porosity

11. Cost & benefits
Oxygen Enrichment of Sulfur Recovery
Units (Sru)
 Increased capacity in the Claus plant, so
that the sulfur capacity can be increased
by up to 100%.
 Higher flame temperature from the
Claus burner, giving better conversion of
pollutants, especially of ammonia.
 Lower volume of gas from the Claus
plant that reduces the load on the tail-
gas treatment process
 the cost of implementing SRU oxygen
enrichment is only 5-20% of the cost for
building a new SRU.

12. conclusion
To achieve the optimum Claus process
design for any feed composition, all
suitable processes should be fully
explored with a process simulator
before making design decisions.

14. references
i. http://www.chemicalprocessing.co
m/articles/2005/452/
ii. http://chemengineering.wikispaces.
com/Claus+process
iii. http://www.iitk.ac.in/che/jpg/pap
ersb/full%20papers/S%20-
%20122%20.pdf
iv. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claus
_process